


Christopher Chow, Proud Father of Twenty-Something

by ObscureReference



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: F/M, Fire, Gen, Minor Chris "Chowder" Chow/Caitlin Farmer, New Frogs - Freeform, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-07
Updated: 2017-02-07
Packaged: 2018-09-22 13:44:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9610022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObscureReference/pseuds/ObscureReference
Summary: Somewhere around the time Chowder had been voted captain of the hockey team, he had developed a routine.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [3daysout (kissander)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kissander/gifts).



> I offered a fic request to a friend of mine, and she wanted Chowder as captain of the hockey team. And you know what? He's doing a good job.

Somewhere around the time Chowder had been voted captain of the hockey team, he had developed a routine.

It had developed _before_ he became captain but still around the same time. Bitty had said it was part of the reason he had been voted captain in the first place, among other things. Things like “team spirit” and “determination.” Something about his ability to keep everyone on track. Chowder was a little fuzzy on the details. Every time he asked, his brain exploded a little because apparently everyone thought he was a good leader and they wanted _him_ to be captain— _him_ , Chris Chow—and, oh, wow, that was a lot.

Anyway, he had developed a routine.

First, wake up. If there was morning practice, then wake up extra early. Next, call Tango to make sure he makes it on time. He probably didn’t go to bed until three in the morning last night and slept through the alarms. Possibly, he slept on the Haus stairs again. It had happened twice so far.

Take a shower. 

Call Tango _again_ because he probably fell back asleep. Listen to him tiredly ramble about theoretical scenarios in which he actually proves ghosts are real.

“ _But what counts as proof? And how will I know it if I find it? Can you listen to some audio I recorded last night? It sounds weird, but I need a second opinion.”_

Yes, absolutely, Chowder promises. He’ll make time this afternoon. Also, Tango, you should really eat something before practice, and also maybe shower? Don’t you have morning classes?

“Oh, yeah,” Tango would say. “Thanks.”

Then Tango would hang up. Cool.

It was often an effort to push the speculation of what Tango could have recorded out of his head, but Chowder somehow managed it each morning. He already sort of knows ghosts are real because there’s no way Ransom had been making all that stuff up for so many years, but actual _proof_ of a ghost is something else altogether. Like. Wow! Real ghosts! On _camera_! Tango would be the most famous person _ever._ And Chowder would get to see it first!

But ghosts come second to health and hockey, so he pushes that thought out of his mind. For now.

Chowder usually sent a “Good morning! <3” text to Farmer before breakfast. She probably wouldn’t open it until it was she woke up sometime around noon because she took night classes, but he always sent one anyway.

Then it was time for breakfast. And then practice.

Before Chowder had become captain, he had normally reached Faber early and skated circles around the ice as a warmup before everyone else got there. Usually it was slow, lazy circles. The kind of leisurely pace he didn’t always get to do on other days. Then he waited for everyone else to arrive and for practice to officially start.

As captain, he still did all those things. Now, though, he usually said something like, “Let’s go!” or “Get ready!” before the coaches told them what to do. It was his job to be encouraging. He hoped he was doing it well enough. There were only so many things he could say before practice.  

Sometimes if Dex and Nursey were in particularly bad moods—or particularly _good_ moods, since it was hard to tell the difference some days—they would bump shoulders during practice and try to run each other into the wall. They normally weren’t going fast enough to actually hurt each other and it could be rather funny too, but it still had the potential to become a distraction. When that happened, Chowder made it a point to stare them down until they got back on track. They shared a room; there were plenty of other opportunities to flirt or kill each other later.

“Guys, come on,” he chided when they somehow managed to ignore his glaring. “Focus!”

When they had been frogs, nothing had ever gotten in the way of Nursey and Dex’s sniping at one another. Now, though, they always pulled apart and told Chowder, “Sorry.” It still boggled his mind every time it happened.

When practice was over, Chowder usually ran into the shower and hurried off to class. He was doing pretty okay in most of them, but he never felt comfortable enough to skip unless he was exhausted from a game the night before. Since there weren’t any games scheduled in the upcoming future, nor had there been one last night, he attended lecture.

Bitty had graduated, so there were no more snack pies, but Chowder stopped by the Haus in the afternoon anyway.

That was normally when he made good on his promise to listen to Tango’s tape. He always made good on his promises.

“I don’t know,” Chowder usually said uncertainly, pressing the headphones tightly against his ears as if that could make the recording any clearer. Often the “suspicious” audio sounded a lot like the floor of the Haus settling. Sometimes it sounded almost like a giggle. But he was never sure. “It could maybe be a ghost?”

Tango usually hummed and started playing around with his computer after that. Later, he would probably text Chowder to say that the results were inconclusive and add that he would keep trying. Chowder did his best to encourage Tango’s hobbies while also reminding him of his obligation to the team. Sometimes Tango took ghost hunting a little too far. It was especially difficult to find the right balance between encouragement and discouragement because Chowder was really excited for the day Tango finally found real evidence of a ghost. But he didn’t want Tango to run himself ragged either.

That was typically around the time Chowder looked out the front window to make sure Whiskey wasn’t being lured across the street by one of the LAX bros. They were sneaky guys, those LAX bros. Holster had warned him a million times not to let the lacrosse team pull any funny business after Holster graduated. Chowder was pretty sure stealing one of their teammates counted as funny business.

Also, he was pretty sure Whiskey had some kind of Romeo-Juliet thing going on with one of those guys. What was his name? Chad?

Chowder was going to have to ask Whiskey about that one day because as much as he was wary of the LAX team, he didn’t want their teams’ rivalry getting in the way of Whiskey’s happiness. Even if those guys were usually douches.

In the time spanning from afternoon to evening, Chowder worked on homework. As best as he could, anyway. It was hard to stay focused when there were a million other much more interesting videos or facts he could be looking at.

(Also, any distraction from thinking about his future was a good distraction.)

Like today, for instance.

 

 

 

 

“Uh, Chris?” One of the new frogs—Oreo—had poked his head in from the kitchen. Chowder looked up from his laptop. He hadn’t even known Oreo was there. “Can you come here for a sec’?”

“Sure!” Chowder said. He practically threw his laptop aside and clambered over the back of the couch. “What do you need?”

It was the captain’s job to be there for his team. Chowder anxiously dreaded the day a problem arose that he couldn’t take care of. Jack, Ransom, Bitty, and Holster had all sworn a million different ways that he could call if he ever needed anything, but Chowder didn’t want it to seem like he couldn’t handle himself, even if he hadn’t been doing this captain thing too long. He wanted them to know they’d picked the right guy.

Oreo stood in the kitchen doorway, lips drawn in an uncomfortable line. There was a telltale splotch of whipped cream in his dark hair. Chowder smiled.

“I think something went wrong,” Oreo said. He didn’t look sheepish, exactly, but he was glancing over his shoulder nervously. Chowder put on his best “I’m Here For You” face.

“It’s probably nothing we can’t fix,” he said.

Oreo glanced over his shoulder again. “Uh.”

He had probably just made a mess, Chowder thought. Or the fridge had finally given out or something. They had been expecting something like that to happen for a while. The team had been specifically saving up for it with the Sin Bin.

Oreo baked, which was something Bitty had squealed with excitement over when Chowder had told him. Unfortunately, unlike Bitty, Oreo only made cookies or cookie-related products. Also, he namely liked to work Oreo cookies. Go figure.

On the other hand, they were _really good_ cookies. Chowder hadn’t known what an Oreo Ball was before Oreo—the person, not the food—showed up. Chowder wanted twenty dozen of them.

The scent of something bad hit the air, and the smile dropped off Chowder’s face. It didn’t smell good. In fact, it smelled a little like—

Oreo turned around. “Oh. I didn’t think it would spread that fast.”

There was enough nervousness in his voice to set Chowder on edge.

“You didn’t think what—“

Chowder maneuvered around Oreo into the kitchen.

The stovetop was on fire.

It was a gas stovetop, so Chowder had seen the stove alight with fire before. Tiny flames. Baby flames.

These were not tiny flames.

Chowder instinctively shoved Oreo behind him. The fire on the stove was decently large, though not enormous. He could feel the heat from where he was standing, but. He could deal with this. This was. Manageable. Yeah.

Somewhere in the background, Oreo said, “Oh, jeez.”

Secretly, Chowder agreed.

But he wasn’t about to let the Haus burn down under his watch, and it didn’t take a genius to see the gas switch was still flipped to “On.” He could do this.

In what was one of the riskiest moves of his college career, Chowder ducked low and made for the stove.

The fire was hot. _Uncomfortably_ hot. But it reached high, not low, and while Chowder hissed at its heat, he managed to twist the stove knob to the “Off” position without any major burns. The back of his knuckles did sting though. But the gas was cut immediately. The fire went out.

He wasn’t sure that had been the right thing to do. He probably should have grabbed a fire extinguisher or something. Or told Oreo to call 911.

But there were no scorch marks on the ceiling—Chowder looked up to check—and the fire was out. So it was a win in the end.

“Okay,” Chowder said, pretending to be much more put-together than he felt, his heart beating a million miles an hour. He turned around. “I don’t know what you did, but let’s not do that again.”

Oreo stared at him with wide eyes. He nodded.

Chowder eyed the stove. “Also, maybe we shouldn’t cook anything in here. Just for the rest of the day.”

Again, Oreo nodded. He looked pale enough that his freckles were standing out stark against his face.

Chowder took pity on him. He had no idea what Oreo had been doing that had involved the stove at all, but he was pretty sure Oreo wasn’t going to do it again. He opened the kitchen window to let the smoke out and ushered the frog into the living room.

“Let’s sit down for a minute,” he suggested, settling Oreo on the couch. His computer blinked at him with unread emails. He ignored it. “Do you want some milk?”

He had no idea why he offered milk of all things. Probably because milk and cookies went together? But Oreo was a person, not a food. He wasn’t even sure they had non-expired milk. Chowder despaired.

But Oreo nodded, so he ventured back into the kitchen to find some milk. They had just enough left for a glass. Chowder relaxed.

“It’s okay,” Chowder said as he handed the drink off. “Everything worked out in the end. No harm done.”

Finally, after a long moment of silence, Oreo opened his mouth.

“Holy shit,” he said.

Chowder silently agreed.

 

 

 

 

After setting a reminder to inspect the stove later and reassuring Oreo that they weren’t going to charge him for damaging Haus property, it was time for dinner.

Dinner was one of Chowder’s favorite parts of the day. It was when he saw Farmer.

She greeted him with a kiss on the cheek, and Chowder responded by throwing her over his shoulder and carrying her the rest of the way to the food court. On the days when they didn’t walk hand-in-hand, Farmer sometimes carried _him_ instead, but Chowder still had some residual energy from the earlier excitement over the fire. He was eager for something to do.

Farmer giggled and allowed herself to dangle over his shoulder. Chowder had grown a few more inches since freshmen year, so it was a little easier than it had been when they had first met. Though he was pretty sure he would have carried her to the ends of the earth even if he were only six inches tall. He would have found a way.

He was also pretty sure she smacked his ass while they walked. He felt himself blush.

 “All right, put me down,” Farmer said as they neared the line. “Let’s eat. You can tell me about your day after we get some food.”

They had barely settled down at a table when Chowder’s phone buzzed with a text. He glanced at it and nearly choked on his lasagna.

_Nursey:_

_Is it true you battled 100ft flames and saved Oreo’s life + the Haus 2day?_

Chowder blinked. He knew the frogs could occasionally be gossipers, but he had no idea where Nursey had gotten _that_ idea.

He was in the middle of composing an answer when a text from Dex rolled in.

 _Are there burns on the ceiling?_ Dex asked. Then, in another text: _Should I be looking at the stove?_

 _Maybe_ , Chowder answered him.

Buzz. There was another text from Nursey.

_Frogs say you were a fireman in a past life._

Then:

_Scratch that. A phoenix._

And then:

_Ur that Fantastic 4 guy that lights on fire. Capt. America or smthn_

Chowder felt the tips of his ears go red. He wondered if this was how Jack had felt as captain.

Another text came in. Apparently news of his adventure this afternoon was suddenly reaching everyone at once. This time the message was from Bitty.

Bitty asked, _IS MY KITCHEN OKAY???_

“Oh, man,” Chowder groaned.

Farmer looked at him. “What’s up?”

Chowder sighed. He set his phone aside. He was probably going to get a thousand more messages in a second, but that could wait. Farmer was in the here and now.

“Okay, so let me tell you about what happened this afternoon.”

The life of a captain sure was exhausting.

(He very much liked it though.)

**Author's Note:**

> Nursey is getting his Marvel universes mixed up. Chris Evans plays The Human Torch in the 2005 Fantastic Four movies. He also plays Captain America. He's getting his heroes confused. Whether on purpose or accident is up to you. 
> 
> My [tumblr!](http://someobscurereference.tumblr.com/)


End file.
